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thenightling · 6 years

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My Fictional Character obsessions as depicted in gifs

My obsessions from age ten onward as depicted in gifs. Some of these characters have alternated in cycles over the years. The ones with the * next to them are ones that have stood the test of time or are particularly strong obsessions. I am not posting them in a particular order, that would take too long to sort out and may change depending on my mood, however the current strongest obsession is at the bottom.

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my fictional character obsessions through the years... Or as Tumblr calls them... My “Garbage children.”

Note: I know only some of them count as “garbage children.” So please don’t be offended that I may have called your favorite character a garbage child.

Rumplestiltskin as depicted in the show Once Upon a Time, particularly seasons 1 through 3.

*Loki from Norse mythology and Marvel comics. Tom Hiddleston is a great actor but I felt I should note that the MCU version is slightly disappointing, I wish they wouldn’t downplay the magick and try to pass them off as “alien.”

*Dracula. There are many depictions of Dracula that I am fond of / obsessed with. Fred Saberhagen’s Dracula books for example, The Frank Wildhorn Dracula musical, and a few movie and TV versions.

I love the 90s Dracula TV series even though he’s blond in that (not to be confused with the awful NBC show version from the twenty teens) but I have no Gifs of the 90s one. Nor do I have any gifs of Rudolf Martin as Dracula in Buffy or Dark Prince: The True Story of Dracula though I love that one. But here’s the most recent version to feed my obsession. Dracula of Castlevania (The Netflix series). Look at that Adorkable vampire!

*Jack Skellington of Nightmare before Christmas was one of my first truly all-consuming obsessions. I played the cassette of the soundtrack to death. I had a shelf of the toys (which were actually rare in the early 90s). I became fixated on Danny Elfman’s singing voice as well as the gorgeous and haunting visuals.

Sally, who helped kindle my first Frankenstein obsession because until then I had never seen an intelligent Frankenstein monster. I hadn’t yet learned that in the original novel he was articulate (once he learned how to speak) and intelligent, and did not have a flat head or neck bolts. Sally and later The Bride (1985 movie) eventually got me to read the novel and pointed me in the right direction.

The ORIGINAL Peter Vincent from Fright Night, as played by Roddy McDowell. I loved his character growth. I loved watching him go from cowardly pretender to being the hero he always pretended to be and still having that B movie cheese to him. Peter Vincent is my favorite vampire hunter. Named after two of my favorite horror movie actors. Peter Cushing and Vincent Price.

Lestat. Yes, I went through an Anne Rice obsession in my teens. What 90s teenager didn’t?

The Dresden Files TV series, particularly Bob The Ghost AKA Hrothbert of Bainbridge as played by Broadway great, Terrence Mann. Though short lived I loved that snarky ghost and this introduced me to the book series. It was also the first TV series I enjoyed after my mother passed away so it has a special bittersweet place in my heart.

Another ghost character I love but I have no picture for him is Captain Gregg from the novel, movie, and TV show The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. And Patrick Stewart as The Canterville Ghost from 1995 (as well as the original Oscar Wilde Story).

Jareth from Labyrinth (and David Bowie). Does he need an explanation?

Morbius from Marvel comics. Because I just loved that emo SOB.

Nick on Forever Knight. I went through an emo vampire phase in the 90s, okay...

The Doctor on Doctor Who

Methos from Highlander the series. Highlander the series was a LOT better than people give it credit for. And Methos was the first fictional character with a truly dark past I had ever seen, who mostly became a decent person after years of penance and self analysis. It was through Highlander that I finally saw fiction and characters with shades of grey and realized things aren’t always black and white. When they revealed Methos’ dark past I was so worried it was an excuse to kill him off and show that he was secretly evil all along but no. They didn’t do that. Highlander taught me just how much people CAN change. And it also taught me a lot about history and inspired me to be curious about our world and its past. (It also often helped me with Social Studies tests.)

Frank Langella as Dracula.

Faust from Goethe’s Faust. (The 1926 silent film is the most faithful adaptation and actually covers Faust and Faust Part 2. Most adaptations leave out Part 2).

Thomas Jerome Newton from The Man who fell to Earth. Movie and novel by Walter Tevis. Yes, depicted in the movie by David Bowie... You’re lucky Bowie doesn’t turn up more in this list than he already does.

Maleficent. This one is kind of a guilty pleasure...

As a long time book lover (One the first books I remember reading and loving was In a Dark Dark Room by Alvin Shwartz at age four...) Belle from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast was the first Disney Princess I truly related to.

Elisa and “Charlie” from The Shape of Water.

The Beast / Prince and Belle in Le Belle et la Bete original 1740 novel and the 2014 French film (even though that film isn’t all that faithful and Belle is a little cold, I love the visuals).

*Luke Goss as the Frankenstein Monster from the 2004 Hallmark mini-series of Frankenstein. The most faithful adaptation of the novel to date. Woefully under-rated. Note, this spot is for the literary character too.

*Puck from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream AND Disney’s Gargoyles. I love that little bastard.

Mina and Dracula in Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992 film)

Emily The Corpse Bride. Also pretty much anything scored by Danny Elfman gets a slight nod here. I love that man’s music. It just catches me. And I always can tell when it’s one of his scores (And no, I don’t think they all sound the same). They’re just so beautiful and haunting.

The Frankenstein Monster in Penny Dreadful. The second most accurate to the novel. They even go the eyes right.

The Real Ghostbusters animated series. Egon is what inspired me to want to study parapsychology. I loved the nerd characters in shows like this.

Barnabas Collins in the original Dark Shadows. And 1990s version. And Doctor Julia Hoffman, a surprisingly empowered character for a 1960s TV show, which is why it annoys me that more “modern” versions always make her sexually obsessed with Barnabas or a villain or both whereas in the original show she was Barnabas’ closest confidant and even the one Barnabas cried out for whenever he was in trouble. (Admittedly it took hundreds of episodes for them to develop that dynamic but they got there).

Lucifer. TV show incarnation and Sandman comics incarnation.

Cain and The House of Mystery (The House of Mystery counts as a character)

*Morpheus from Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. My current biggest obsession. I’m making up for lost time. This is something I SHOULD have been obsessed with in my teens. I’m thirty-six-years-old and was thirty-five-years-old when I read it for the first time. Why the Hell did no one describe this thing well to me back in the 90s!? Yes, Sandman started when I was only seven-years-old but it was most popular in the mid-90s and I would have probably loved it if I only really knew what it was all about. Instead it was always “He’s like a Goth Jareth” (which almost worked) and “You’ll love Death! She’s so cute!” (which totally didn’t work at all...) Don’t protect me from spoilers, damn it! Tell me about his character growth, the gorgeous artwork, the horror hosts residing in The Dreaming, tell me about the mythology and Shakespeare references, the lore, tell me about the ambiance, the atmosphere, the humor and pathos. For God’s sake, I SHOULD have loved this thing a LONG time ago!

You’d be amazed how hard it is to find a gif of Morpheus- he’s never had a film or TV adaptation but there are fan films! (The gif is from The Sandman fan film, 24 Hour Diner).

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Honorable mentions:

Lydia from the Beetlejuice animated series (My mother’s best friend often compared me to her but I think I had a crush on the character...)

Xena: Warrior Princess (when I figured out I’m not entirely straight). Though I think I liked Gabrielle a little more than Xena, herself.

The mermaid in She-Creature (2001 film, not the black and white film of the same name)

The Crypt Keeper from Tales from the Crypt.

Carmilla (vampire novella and Hammer horror film The Vampire Lovers)

Duncan Macleod from Highlander the series.

Various characters from Buffy The Vampire Slayer (TV series) including Buffy herself, Giles and Spike.

Doctor Strange (And in relation to that, Doctor Craven from the Vincent Price movie The Raven from 1963.)

Bruce “David” Banner in The Incredible Hulk, particularly as depicted by Bill Bixby. Though that was more of a role model personality type that I saw as a truly good man in a bad situation.

Dorian Gray from the Picture of Dorian Gray

Elisa in Disney’s Gargoyles but I idolized her more than obsessed about her. There is a difference.

The reason those aren’t properly on the list is because those aren’t precisely obsessions but just characters I happened to really like a lot.

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inthepursuitofbooks · 7 years

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Joss Whedon is problematic

I love Buffy. It’s by far my favorite TV show. It’s my security blanket. When I’m sick, Buffy and mac & cheese. When I’m sad, Buffy. When I’m stressed, Buffy. That being said, as I get older I notice the more problematic points of the show, and later the comics (I stopped reading the comics when Xander and Dawn started having their weird thing). As I get older and the more I hang out with “woke” women and learn terms like “intersectional feminism,” the more I notice the problems I have with Joss Whedon. Don’t get me wrong, I will always love Buffy, but I’m slowly having to watch it in the mindset that I watch I Love Lucy and I Dream of Jeannie: for its time it was revolutionary, but is clearly dated in the handling of the relationships and the script. I mean, the show was the first mainstream usage of the word “google” as a verb. It was also one of the first to show a lesbian couple. The more research I do on the show, however, leads me to believe that a great many of those choices were not Whedon’s doing, but the other writers such as Jane Espenson, whose credits include “Husbands,” “Battlestar Galactica,” “Warehouse 13,” and “Once Upon a Time.”

One of the main problems I have with Whedon is his weird fascination with making “strong female characters” only show their strength when they’ve been broke, damaged, or struck with illness. Examples of this include the plans for Inara had Firefly gone beyond a single season (article can be found here), Anya’s entire arc from ruthless, badass vengeance demon to a somewhat simpering, bitter, sarcastic woman, Cordelia’s final storyline and the travesty of what happened to her character simply because Whedon got mad that Charisma had the gall to get pregnant (here is a great 2-part blog discussing the problems with Cordelia, there’s also this video where she discusses her return and official death to the show,) Fred’s final story arc, the handling of Natasha Romonoff in Age of Ultron and Loki’s calling her a “mewling quim” in Avengers, River Tam’s entire character, etc. Whedon seems to be obsessed with “break the pretty one” kind of trope.

Another problem I have is his inability to not self-insert. Xander’s entire character, from silly shirts to general nerd, is a giant self-insertion of Whedon into his creation. It’s saying something about how Whedon also views himself through Xander’s character. The more times I watch Buffy, the more I realize Xander is the “woe is me, I’m a nice guy why doesn’t anyone want me, I deserve credit for not raping her even though I was trying to force Cordelia to love with a spell, essentially raping her mind” kind of guy. Here is a great write-up on the problems of Xander. There’s also this write-up discussing the “Xander trope.” He also tried to say the reason he loved working on Avengers was getting to work with the Steve Rogers character because “we’re basically the same.” HA. NO. STAHP.

The entirety of Dollhouse. The whole show is a problem. The entire creeptastic thing.

Angel and the weird relationship of a 16-year-old and a 217-year-old. Don’t get me wrong, Spike and Buffy was weird too (yay for Spuffy shipping even though I’m aware of the issues), buy Spike and Buffy were together a few years after she turned 18. It’s still weird. Exactly what kind of mindset does a multi-century old creature have to be in to think “Oh hey. She’s a tasty morsel and she’s 16! Sixteen was grown in my day!” *bleh*

Whedon has a diversity issue starting with creation of the First Slayer through each of the Slayers killed on the show to Firefly and its entire Chinese/Western future world. This isn’t the problem, it’s inspired greatly by the anime Outlaw Star. The problem is THERE ARE LITTLE TO NO ASIAN PEOPLE IN THIS SHOW. Where are they? If, in this future the Chinese have taken over and melded with American Western Cowboys, where are they? Where are all the Asians? Summer Glau is amazing, but when asked why cast her and Sean Maher as the Tams, Whedon replied “They looked Asian.” I can’t find the interview, but if I do, I’ll link it. The First Slayer: a hyper-racist archetype of the most violent tribal black woman he could think of, the second slayer to die: a Chinese woman in the boxer rebellion, the third slayer to die: FUCKING KENDRA and her really strange Jamaican accent.

Moving away from Buffy (even though I could continuously discuss the problems I have with my fave) there’s the sterility issue with Natasha Romonoff. He took her from being a badass woman in her own right to be nothing more than the love interest of Dr. Banner/The Hulk in some weird Beauty and the Beast trope in Age of Ultron. He then also had her discuss why she considered herself a monster. It wasn’t because she was an assassin or because she had been trained to kill or any of that, it was because she was unable to bear children. Not taking into account how awful that monologue must have felt to women who have trouble conceiving, the entire speech stinks of misogynistic bullshit. What was, in the comics, a commentary on state-perpetrated robbing of a female’s body autonomy, is reduced to a soliloquy of regret. It could have been, and some do see it as, a moment where she is regretting her loss of choice. However, the fact that she refers to herself as monstrous, not because she killed a man in cold blood to “graduate” but because she can’t have children is a frightening commentary of the view of a woman’s place despite her skills or intelligence. There’s also, as I mentioned earlier, the moment in Avengers where Loki calls Natasha a “mewling quim.” He called her a cunt. Whedon thinks he’s being clever to get by the censors. For that reason, I’m terrified of how his handling of Batgirl is going to go.

Again, all of Dollhouse. That show is basically an ode of Whedon’s love of tough tiny women getting punched in the face.

The character of Drusilla and what Angelus did to her. However, kudos to the legit evilness that is Angelus. I can appreciate when a character is evil just to be an evil dick.

Another issue I have is that, yes, he was a feminist. Back in the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s. He hasn’t evolved with the times. He hasn’t grown with age. His feminism is one of strictly white females and has not changed since the first Buffy movie, however I am glad that the tv show evolved to not having the slayer sense when evil is near by way of CRAMPS. Seriously. His “strong female characters” sway more toward waif-like and skinny. The entirety of “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog” is an example of “I’m better for her so I should have her” thought process of the fedora-wearing nice-guy crowd. The choice of Felicia Day’s character to be with Captain Hammer is never considered. The language used in a lot of his writing leans toward ableist. He uses the word “retard” and “midget” several times across several of his creations.

Here’s another great discussion on feminism and Joss Whedon. I think I may have linked it earlier, but just in case I didn’t, there it is. There’s also an entire blog dedicated to discussing Joss Whedon which you can find here.

I rambled a bit, and I may add to edit this again later, but this was just a quick think and dump write-up for a friend. If you have more receipts of Joss Whedon’s lack of feminist growth, please feel free to add.

#Joss Whedon #feminism #Buffy #btvs #buffy the vampire slayer #angel #angel the series #firefly #serenity

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allthevmff · 5 years

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Scoobies in Neptune

by lateVMlover

I began writing fanfiction in 2010 due to my obsession with Veronica Mars fanfiction. Many of you may not know that the VM in my handle stands for that show. Although it's not even my top ten favorite show, I LOVED the characters that Rob Thomas created, so I spent years writing several stories only for Veronica Mars. In fact, I've written 1,259,643 words that were solely about Veronica Mars. Then I grew bored and now almost exclusively write Buffy the Vampire Slayer crossovers. However, I've had this idea for a story percolating in the back of mind for a few years now. I've finally put it down on paper.

This story is set after BTVS season 4 and Veronica Mars season 3. It's beginning in the summer after Veronica has left for her summer internship with the FBI. I've altered some key things in the Buffyverse. Faith didn't go evil in season 3, but instead was killed long enough to activate a new slayer. Kennedy is called in her place and makes Sunnydale so unbearable that the gang decides to move away. Neptune is not too far, and Buffy, Willow, and Tara transfer to Hearst while Giles and Faith are guarding the hellmouth in Ohio. Season 4 of BTVS had some serious deviations as Spike isn't a part of the story, and Riley and Buffy were never a couple. This story will not be as plot driven as previous stories. I'm focusing more on the two worlds being thrown together and new connections, friendships, and loves developing.

Disclaimer: Obviously, I do not own either Veronica Mars or BTVS.

I will be moving this story to the crossover page after a bit. It's just been so long since I've written anything for VM that I thought I'd start with it here first. If you are unfamiliar with BTVS this story might not be for you. However, if you know the characters from the show, you should have no trouble following it as it's set entirely in Rob Thomas' Neptune world.

Chapter 1: A Fresh Start

*****Neptune*****

Buffy looked at the small house her mom had bought in Neptune in satisfaction. The one-story dwelling was so much easier to unpack than their other place had been four years ago. The square footage wasn't that different from their old home in Sunnydale, but she did have a bit more space in her room. The third bedroom, however, was on the small size. Happily, they each had their own bathroom, so Buffy had no reason to complain. The large formal dining room that their Sunnydale home had boasted was absent from this house, but it had a large kitchen that their table could fit into as long as they kept the extension out of it. Of course, the main thing the house had was a large basement that she could use to keep up her training.

Her phone rang. "Hey, Will. Are you and Tara unpacked?" she asked. "I'm finally done."

"Not even close," Willow said. "Tara and I found this amazing coffee house by campus called Java Hut, so we're totally distracted. Things are so bright and shiny here, Buffy, so we're not sure what to do."

Buffy laughed. "I know what you mean. Just being away from the hellmouth makes me feel warm and happy," she said.

"Exactly!" Willow agreed. "The reason I called was to tell you that Xander called and said that he got called in for the interview for the maintenance team at Hearst. It's in five days."

"That's great!" Buffy said. "I can't imagine not having our Xander-shaped friend around. What about Anya?"

"Anya doesn't want to leave the hellmouth or her job. Giles made her a partner in the Magic Box before he and Faith left for Ohio," Willow said.

"Doesn't she know she will have to deal with Kennedy if she sticks around?" Buffy asked.

"Well, you know Anya. She'll just tell Kennedy exactly how she feels in that special manner of hers," Willow said in amusement. "Xander did say she threatened to get a vengeance demon friend of hers to hex Kennedy if she tried ordering her around again."

When Kennedy's bullying ways had made Tara cry a month before, a big fight had broken out. Buffy had already planned to relocate shortly after Faith had died and been brought back, thus activating Kennedy the Bitch.

"We can all learn from Anya," Buffy said. Of course, Buffy was action girl. Actions speak louder, and her leaving town said all she needed to say.

"So are we going to the beach this evening?" Willow asked.

"Most definitely," Buffy said. She said goodbye after planning where to meet up and then decided to go shopping for a new swimsuit.

She took a leisure stroll and thought about all the changes that had occurred the past year. After her second month in Sunnydale, Faith had been nearly drained by Mr. Trick. Buffy had thrown Faith over her shoulder and rushed to the hospital, but Faith had flatlined almost immediately. Luckily, they managed to revive and transfuse her. At her mother's instance, Faith had spent a week recovering at their house. The experience had bonded the two slayers like nothing had before. Because Giles had allowed Faith to stay in his spare room, Buffy had been really jealous of Faith. An only child, sharing didn't come easy to Buffy.

However, Kennedy, the new sixteen-year old slayer, coming to town had united the two slayers even more. She was such a stuck-up bitch that the two older slayers just could not work with her. Luckily, Kennedy showed up after graduation and their defeat of the Mayor. For the first time ever, there were three active slayers. Faith and Kennedy had come to blows three times before Giles and Wesley decided that the three of them needed to be spread out across the country. Buffy asked to be allowed to ease out of slaying if Kennedy survived her first year on the hellmouth, so Wesley and Giles had flipped a coin to see who'd get Faith.

Faith and Giles left right after Christmas at the beginning of the new year. That meant that Faith stayed in Sunnydale long enough to seduce Buffy's psychology TA, Riley, and found out he was hiding a very big secret. The military was playing on the hellmouth, and she and Buffy knew it was not a good thing. When Faith discovered they'd chipped a newly returned to town Spike, she'd been pissed—equating it with tying up a dog and leaving it to starve to death. She was going to put him out of his misery and stake him, but Buffy decided sending him to Los Angeles for Angel to deal with was a better option.

A new town was definitely the right way to go for her and her friends.

She was hoping that the new location would work some magic on her love life because Buffy was tired of being single. She'd had the one-night stand with Parker the previous fall and that was it. The very yummy Graham had asked her out, but after discovering his entire fraternity was a front, she couldn't trust him. Now she was ready to have fun or something real. Without the burden of the hellmouth weighing her down, she was free to be a normal college student.

Her mother had decided to leave the dangers of the hellmouth and move to Neptune with Buffy. Willow had been the one to mention Hearst to Buffy. The small liberal arts college was only an hour from Sunnydale, so Buffy could easily get there if Kennedy needed a hand. Willow and Tara had been very eager to leave with Buffy, joining her at Hearst.

Giles won Faith in the coin toss and moved to Ohio with her at the beginning of the year. Although Kennedy had arrived in town with her own Watcher, the woman had been too sensitive to the dark forces radiating from the hellmouth and had asked to be relocated. Her abandonment had worked to make Kennedy even more difficult. Faith, though, was loving being back in a state with real winter as the Boston native really loved the snow Ohio had.

Buffy missed Giles a lot. Although Wesley was better as a Watcher in his second year, she hated that Giles was so far away. Talking on the phone was not the same thing. She and her friends did go to Ohio for Spring Break, though. The hellmouth was much tamer than Sunnydale, but they slayed a few vamps while patrolling with Faith.

She found a shop that looked promising and went in. Neptune had outlet shops scattered around town. The ones close to campus, though, seemed to cater to girls Buffy's age. Luckily, her new house was only five miles from campus. For Buffy, it was merely a nice walk.

"Oh, this is cute!" she said as she grabbed a summer dress. She saw three more and went and tried them on. Her dad allowed her to use her emergency credit card for school clothes, so she didn't feel guilty when she decided to buy all four of them.

Then she went to the swimsuits. A murmuring voice caught her attention, and she looked up. A girl around her age and height was looking at swimsuits with a mulish expression on her face. The attractive brunette had blue tipped hair, which intrigued Buffy as no one back home put colors like that in her hair.

"I don't know why she expects me to waste my hard-earned money on stupid crap," the girl mumbled to herself.

"I take it you don't love clothes shopping?" Buffy asked, giving her a friendly smile.

"I'd rather have a root canal," the girl replied.

"I love shopping," Buffy said.

The girl looked Buffy over and smirked. "You would love shopping," she said.

"I'm taking that as a compliment even though I feel like you didn't mean it as one," Buffy said.

"Sorry," the girl said. "It's just you're wearing one of those cool summer outfits that makes a woman look sexy without effort. Your blonde and beautiful with the long, flowing hair. Are you an 09er?"

Buffy laughed, never having had someone call her beautiful as an insult before. "I don't think so. I'm Buffy. Buffy Summers. I just moved to town," Buffy said.

"Buffy?" the girl said with a smile. "Well, I think you'll fit right in with the 09ers. I'm Cindy Makenzie, but people call me Mac."

"Nice to meet you, Mac," Buffy said. "Do you attend Hearst?"

"I do," Mac said. "Computer science major."

"Oh, my best friend Willow is a computer whiz, too," Buffy said with a bright smile. "She's going to be going to Hearst, too. You might have her in some classes."

"Another girl in the computer science program?" Mac asked, her eyes lighting up.

"Yep. If you're not doing anything later, we're going to the beach behind the campus dorms," Buffy said. "I can introduce you to her and her girlfriend Tara. They are both taking a summer class, so they got into the dorms early."

"Well, I'm leaving in the morning for my family's summer vacation," Mac said. "But I can drop by and meet your friends."

"Oh, so you're buying a new suit for the trip? That's nice. Mine's like two years old," Buffy said. "But in my old town, I seemed to go from one crisis to another and no real beach time."

Mac had to revise her initial impression of the blonde Barbie with the ridiculous name as she was way too friendly to be an 09er. Openly admitting to struggles was also not an 09er trait.

"Where's home?" Mac inquired.

"Well, I was born and raised in Los Angeles, but when my parents split up almost five years ago, I moved to Sunnydale. It's about the size of Neptune but an hour from here," Buffy explained.

"The town with the weird outbreak of laryngitis?" Mac asked, intrigued.

Buffy was surprised she knew that. "Oh, well, yes. The town had a few weird and bad elements," she said.

"I'm not sure Neptune is an improvement," Mac warned. "The 09ers rule it, and there's oodles of corruption."

As no one could ever be more corrupt than the former Mayor of Sunnydale, who turned into a giant snake and ate students at Buffy's high school graduation, she wasn't worried. Of course, she said nothing about that. "What are 09ers?" Buffy asked, frowning. Mac kept saying it like Buffy should know, and she was starting to feel stupid.

"Neptune has two zip codes, 09 and 02. 09 is where the uber wealthy live like the Kanes," she said.

"I take it you're an 02er?" Buffy asked with a grin since she found this zip code division more than a bit silly.

"Yep. Class warfare is very real in this town," Mac said.

"I can't believe it's big enough for two zip codes," Buffy said. "Sunnydale has a USC campus and still only had one zip code."

"That's probably because it wasn't full of elitist snobs that got the city to alter the town charter and give a few neighborhoods their own zip code," Mac said.

"Well, we had a real gang problem in Sunnydale," Buffy said.

"We have that here, but they're not the worst thing," Mac said.

Buffy now had to wonder if Giles was right about Neptune not being hellmouthy. Then again, Los Angeles had no hellmouth, but it had a combination of evil people and dark elements.

The girls finally stopped gossiping and tried on some bathing suits. Buffy decided on a two piece and one cute piece while Mac got a dark blue on piece, not much different than her old black one piece. She refused a red one that Buffy tried to talk her in to buying. Her reluctance reminded Buffy a lot of Willow, so Buffy was quick to like the girl with blue-tipped hair.

Buffy paid for her purchases, and Mac gave Buffy her cell phone number. Mac couldn't believe she didn't have a cell phone.

"Me and technology are unmixy things," Buffy said with a careless shrug. "Willow and Xander, my other best friend, have them, though. If I'm not home, I'm with them normally." Cell phones were superfluous in her line of work. Of course, fighting would be hell on one. Now that she was not really slaying, though, maybe she should get one.

At her confession, Mac gave her a look of horror. "You're a luddite?" she asked.

"Since I know what that word means, no," Buffy said, grinning. "Willow called Giles, our librarian, that once as he called her computer that infernal machine. I can use the computer if I have to, but Will's so much better at it."

"So why bother?" Mac asked in bemusement.

"I'm action girl. I'd rather be running or sparring or fencing," Buffy said.

"You're a jock?" Mac asked in surprise, forced again to reevaluate Buffy.

"I guess you could say that," Buffy said. "But I'm not really into team sports. I did do cheerleading in middle school and ninth grade, but I got bored with it. The cheerleaders at Sunnydale took it way too seriously," she said, thinking of Amy and her mom.

"Hearst does have a track team and a fencing club you might check out," Mac said.

"Okay, I might," Buffy said. Not having monsters to slay was going to leave her with way too much energy. "I'm not really interested in competing, though. I just like things that are physical because I have way too much energy."

Mac grinned, deciding that she liked the girl with the totally airhead name. Clearly, she was no airhead. She might resemble another pixie blonde Mac knew, but Veronica channeled her boundless energy into doing a dozen tasks in twenty-four hours rather than exercise.

"I better head home and prove to my mom that I did buy a new swimsuit," Mac said with a sigh.

"See you later, I hope," Buffy as she walked out the door with Mac.

Mac assumed the woman would head to a car, so she walked toward her own. However, as she pulled out to the road, she noticed Buffy hoofing it, carrying her two bags. Frowning, Mac pointed her green beetle toward Buffy, pulling up alongside her. She rolled down her window and called out, "Buffy, do you need a ride?" she asked.

"Oh, no. I don't live far," Buffy said with an easy smile.

"What's your address?" Mac asked.

When Buffy rattled it off, Mac looked aghast. "That's five miles! You can't walk that far! Get in, and I'll give you a ride," she said.

"It's really no big deal," Buffy said, amused at Mac's look of horror.

"I insist," Mac said firmly. Buffy shrugged and got in the car.

"Well, thanks," she said. "I walked everywhere back home."

"Your friends don't drive?" Mack asked.

"Yes, Willow and Xander have cars," she said. "Sometimes, they'd pick me up. Mom dropped me off for high school, but I always walked home. Then I lived on campus my year at USC Sunnydale. I don't even notice the walking anymore." Five miles was nothing for a slayer.

"You don't have a license?" Mac asked.

"Nope," she said. "Mom says I'm too terrifying behind the wheel and refused to teach me after I dented her car that one time."

"They have professionals that can teach you, you know," Mac said.

"Yea, one day I suppose I'll get one of those," Buffy said with a grin.

Mac laughed and shook her head. "Maybe, this summer I can show you how to drive," she found herself offering. Normally, she'd never make an offer like that to a stranger. But the idea of a woman not being completely independent bothered her.

"My friends will tell you no to that," Buffy said. "Xander and Giles both tried. Giles has taught me lots of things, but he said that the world was safer if I stayed a pedestrian." Of course, she knew it had more to do with her slayer reflexes than anything else.

Mac pulled into Buffy's driveway and looked at the modest sized home—definitely not an 09er. "I just live three blocks from here—well, my parents do. I'm home for the summer but dorming it in the fall," she shared. "I can't believe you walked so far."

"I told you I have lots of energy. It didn't seem that far," Buffy said. I don't get tired like normal people."

"I so can't relate," Mac said dryly.

Buffy laughed. "It looks like my mom is home. Do you want to come in and meet her?" Buffy offered.

"Next time," Mac said. "If I'm going to have time to meet up with you and your friends later. I need to get home."

"Okay," Buffy said. "Thanks a bunch."

She got out of the car, waving to Mac.

Mac grove away, surprised that she made a friend so easily. It took her almost three years to make two friends in high school.

Of course, Mac had no idea how gifted Buffy was at seeing the best in a person and bringing it out for others to see.

As for Buffy, she skipped inside and happily shared with her mom all the details of her encounter with Mac and modeled each outfit.

Joyce happily listened and watched the small fashion show, so happy to see her daughter this way. It'd been years since she had seen Buffy so carefree and excited to be alive. The burdens of being a slayer were gone, and she was free to be young. For the first time in years, she was free to enjoy life to the fullest.

Joyce knew that moving to Neptune with Buffy was the right decision. Life was short, and Joyce didn't want to miss a moment with Buffy. She'd come too closing to losing her daughter too many times.

"I think this move was a good decision," she said to Buffy.

"Absolutely!" Buffy agreed. "A fresh start for all of us."

Buffy believed Neptune would finally be the home Sunnydale never was.

*****Chapter End*****

So what's your thoughts? Veronica will be in this story, but not until the summer is over. I hope you won't miss her too much, but when she returns, there will be fireworks. Reviews are the best. Thanks!

via FanFiction.Net: Veronica Mars, Last Updated http://bit.ly/2IkqBG0 April 8, 2019 at 03:02AM

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storytellerauthor · 7 years

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A Rant About Redemption and Bad Guys

Hey! So, the other day I read Aimee Meester's post on her blog about how we need to stop romanticizing the villains and grey morality and it was really thought provoking, especially for someone like me. I love bad guys. I love their backstories and their complex character arcs and I love how their usually super flawed and quirky with dynamic, larger than life personalities. I've always been fascinated by them, even when I was little kid and would sit and watch X-Men Evolution and all the Disney movies and read the Sisters Grimm and Percy Jackson. Maybe it was my inner writer but I loved Gambit and Rogue and Puck and Nico. I loved all the characters with the tortured pasts, the characters with a rough present and a foggy future. And now that I'm older and watch "big kid" stuff I love my Loki and Damon and Spike (just finished binging Buffy and Angel and am now getting into the graphic novels because I loved those shows so much!) and Captain Cold from the Flash and Bellamy and Murphy from The 100. I love them all. Though, on a side note, now that I think about it I can't come up with a whole lot the big bad, grey area, antihero female characters. I'm sure there are but I'm drawing a giant blank right now. Anyways back on subject. The bad guys. But I think what I'm trying to get at is what do all these "bad guys" have in common? Yes their either the villain, antihero or antagonist in the main character's story. They aren't even the main characters themselves. But what they all have in common is the character development arc that is Redemption. I love redemption and forgiveness and can this character come back from all the terrible things they've done? Can they be forgiven and can they change and be good? Can they go from being murderers and horrible people to being heroes? There are a few bad guys that I still love that are bad and will always be bad and they probably will never be heroes or anything like a hero but all the baddies I love are the ones with redemption running through their Journey. I think why I love the redemption story is because it reminds me so much of what I've been promised as a Christian. It doesn't matter the horrible things you've done in your past, God will still forgive you. He changes you from the inside out, transforms you from the Big Bad to the Champion. And that's what love does in most character arcs for those antiheroes and antagonists. The heroes are the ones who are chosen. They're the champions.

I'm sorry not really this was just too perfect not to use.

Chosen to fight the good fight, to save the girl and stop the Big Bad (after watching Buffy and Angel now I just call my villains the Big Bad). Yes they should be dynamic and real and exciting with flaws and character growth. They may mess up and make bad decisions but in the end they're the good guy and they will always be the good guy. Look at Angel in his show Angel. He's frequently called the Champion. He's the goodie vampire with the soul who saves damsels in distress and stops the world from falling apart. Yeah he's done a lot horrible things in his life time, seemingly irredeemable things but that's the whole point of his journey. His entire show is about him atoning for his sins, changing his ways and righting his past wrongs. He went through a few rough patches but at the end of the day he's still the Champion and he's pretty easily forgiven. The same goes for Stefan in The Vampire Diaries. Angel needs redemption and so does Stefan, they've both done horrible things, but the point is they were already more or less redeemed from the get-go. Their stories start with them already being the Champion and redeemed and thriving to be better. These other guys? Not so much. Damon, Spike, Murphy, Bellamy, Snart (Captain Cold) and lots of others, they start their stories off as the baddies. Their not nice people. They steal and they kill and they hurt people. Their charming and good looking sure but if you met them in real life you would be running the other way. Bellamy was a jerk in the first season of The 100. Murphy still kind of is even in season 3. Snart was a thief. Damon and Spike are horrible, murderous vampires (which by far outweighs the others). You look at them and think, yeah they're funny and charming and fun bad guys but man are they royal jerks, I do not like them in the slightest. But then, something happens. The big bad, evil vampire falls for the human girl who may see him as the bad guy but doesn't see him as the monster. Bellamy realizes Clarke's actually pretty smart and that if he wants to survive he'd better listen to her. Murphy... well Murphy only turned semi-nice and not as self-serving as before when he's dragged into the desert and falls for a thief. Snart realizes maybe the Flash isn't such a bad guy after all and gains some mutual respect for one another. Usually the protagonist is the one who at some point brings out the best in these bad "irredeemable" villains. And sometimes things just happens that forces the bad guy to do the right thing even if he doesn't want to which then, with some help, turns them into a better person. What do all those have in common? Love, respect, support. And ok... I'm sorry... I tried to stop myself but I just can't. This post is officially going to turn into me using Angel and Spike and some Faith to tell the redemption story because let's face it: Joss Whedon is a genius and knows how to write a good redemption story. I already got my Angel stuff out (I could write for hours about him though) but Spike and Faith? Those were some wicked good characters. *spoiler alerts ahead if you haven't seen these shows and you haven't go watch it right now!* Faith starts out as the second Slayer (long story). She's edgy and was not my favorite person at all. She had this weird, psycho thing about her and turns out I was right. She ended up going a little crazy and killing and torturing and being a horrible person. Buffy wants her put down or at least locked away and for real, you think this girl can not be redeemed. She's done horrible things and is a twisted person. But then she comes across Angel and he breaks her... in a good way. He convinces her to change and because of his friendly love and support and respect Faith wants to change. She doesn't want to be a killer and horrible person anymore. At the end she actually ends up turning herself in and is willing to take her punishment because she knows she deserves it and that she's done bad things. By the end of her story Faith actually ends up being a Champion just like Angel and Buffy and all the other good guys on the show. She helps save the world! And all because someone believed she was worth saving.

From Fred to Spike

Spike... now he's a fun one. I loved him from the moment I met him, when he was seriously so mean and awful and wanted to kill Buffy. I don't think he had a single redeemable quality, except for his love for Drusilla. I just liked him cuz he was funny and a good bad guy. I had hoped Joss Whedon would do something with him and I was not disappointed. Unlike Faith who saw the error in her ways Spike did not... Even when he had a chip put in his head that stopped him from killing people he still wanted it out and he still wanted to be bad. That was until he fell in love with Buffy. Love is very powerful and very important, especially in a redemption story. And ok, he was still weird and kind of disturbing when he obsessed over Buffy but by the end he got over that and just loved her. He fought at her side, helped her out, sat with her when she didn't want to talk. Even when she wasn't around something had changed inside him and he just did the right thing because it was the right thing. And then, he did the ultimate thing that turned him into a Champion. Of his own free will he sought out and got a soul for himself. He willingly got a soul so he could be a better person for Buffy. And by the end of the show he's barely recognizable from the Spike in season 2. He sacrifices his to save the world, not for Buffy, not for himself, but for the sake of being good. Not to mention in Angel he ended up truly declaring himself a Champion because he wants to be one, not just to spite Angel but because he wants to be a Champion, a hero for himself.

Awww!

I guess what I'm trying to say is what does Spike and Damon and Bellamy and Faith and even Murphy have in common? Love and support. All of their stories showcase the power of love and support in it's purest form. Whether is love between friends or romantic love, it doesn't matter. Either way love wins and that is why I love the bad guys so much. Because usually the bad guys I love reveal themselves as Champions by the end. They reveal the power of love (as cheesy as that sounds) and they reveal the power of someone believing in them and supporting them. Without love and support and belief a person is nothing and can accomplish nothing.

So writers, and fangirls in general, no we shouldn't glorify the bad guys who like killing and torturing and hurting. We should write those characters and make sure their well done because without a good villain there can be no good Champion. But instead of writing so many irredeemable, unsaved characters why don't we write redeemable characters? The ones who have made awful decisions and have done bad things and yet the protagonist forgives, supports or even cares about. The ones who the protagonist saves by accident, just because they respected them and showed them some common decency. The ones who the protagonist saves through friendship. Write messy characters who don't get it right all the time but thrive to be better, want to atone for their bad mistakes and want to be saved. I could go on and on with this post but I don't want to make this super long and exhaust the topic because I might just have to come back to this. The truth is, the first couple of seasons of Buffy may have been cheesy and the whole thing was whack but I learned a lot from it as a writer because Joss Whedon is a Champion in the storyteller universe. So I may just come back to those characters and I may come back to this whole redemption thing because the story I'm working on right now is about an immortal gypsy girl without a soul who is thriving for redemption and a vampire who needs saving. A bit darker than Weapon Icean, so I'm learning some new things about my writing and about myself through Phoebe (the FMC) and Jasper (the MMC). I'm going to end this rant with a bit of a challenge, not only to myself but to the writers reading this: Write those Big Bads and then be creative and find a non-cheesy, new and exciting way to turn them into Champions. Sounds like a lot of work to me, but it also sounds like a lot of fun.

What do you think of my rant? Do you agree or disagree about Champions and the Big Bads?

#Writing #villains #tv shows #redemption #Characters #Books #bad guys

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